Information controls and internet shutdowns in African elections: the politics of electoral integrity and abuses of power

Internet shutdowns in Africa are becoming increasingly widespread, particularly when governments face competitive or contentious elections. They have also come to symbolise a widening fracture between competing conceptions of the global Internet and its regulation. Governments in Africa are justifying shutdowns as able address misinformation and disinformation, protect the election process, and ensure national security. International organisations, NGOs, and social networking platforms condemn these as an inadmissible form of censorship and information control, an abuse by political actors seeking to silence critics or manipulate elections. This article offers an alternative reading on internet shutdowns by placing them in the historical context of the wide range of information controls around elections, many of which are widely regarded as being acceptable and legitimate mechanisms to support competitive elections. By offering this context, we can ask what is new about shutdowns and whether they can ever be regarded as a proportionate response to real concerns of social media and election manipulation. We conclude by highlighting the inequalities of online content moderation as an often-overlooked factor in driving the use of shutdowns, and the failure of social media companies to effectively address misinformation and disinformation in Africa, particularly around elections

The Identification of Amino Acids by Interpretation of Titration Curves: An Undergraduate Experiment for Biochemistry

Undergraduate biochemistry students should have great familiarity with titration curves. These curves allow the prediction of protonation states, charges, and isoelectric points. Here we describe an experiment in which students identify four amino acids based on their titration behavior. Students make solutions of each unknown amino acid and monitor the change in pH upon adding aliquots of a strong base. They identify the amino acids based on the shapes of the curves. They annotate the plots with isoelectric points, pKas, buffering regions and the structures of the amino acids

Fragmented QRS is associated with ventricular arrhythmias in heart failure patients: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Introduction: Many primary prevention heart failure (HF) patients with an implantable cardiac defibrillator (ICD) rarely experience life-threatening ventricular arrhythmias (VA). New strategies are required to identify patients most at risk of VA and sudden cardiac death who would benefit from an ICD. One potential method is the detection of fragmented QRS (fQRS) on the electrocardiogram. The aim was to assess the predictive capacity of fQRS for VA and mortality in ischemic (ICM) and non-ischemic cardiomyopathy (NICM) primary prevention HF patients. Methods and Results: A systematic review and meta-analysis of studies examining fQRS in HF patients with or without an ICD who met primary prevention indications with reduced ejection fraction ≤40%. Outcome measures were VA (or appropriate ICD therapy) and all-cause mortality. Ten studies involving 3885 patients were included for analysis. Most patients were male with non-fQRS patients being significantly younger (−1.5[−2.66, −0.42], p = .03). Diabetes was more likely in fQRS patients (1.12[1.01, 1.25], p = .03) while non-fQRS patients were 28% more likely to have a history of atrial fibrillation (0.82[0.67,1.00], p = .05). Ventricular arrhythmias were significantly 1.5 times more likely in patients with fQRS (1.51[1.02, 2.25], p = .04). HF patients were 1.7 times more likely to die of any cause if fQRS was present (1.68[1.13, 2.52], p = .01). NICM patients with fQRS have a significant 2.6-fold increased incidence of death compared with ICM patients (2.55[1.63, 3.98], p < .0001). Conclusion: fQRS is associated with VA and all-cause mortality and may be a novel marker in the risk stratification of primary prevention HF patients indicated for ICD implantation

Primary prevention implantable cardiac defibrillators: a Townsville district perspective

Background: Despite major advances in treating patients with severe heart failure, deciding who should receive an implantable cardiac defibrillator (ICD) remains challenging. Objective: To study the risk factors and mortality in patients after receiving an ICD (January 2008–December 2015) in a regional hospital in Australia. Methods: Eighty-two primary prevention patients received an ICD for ischemic cardiomyopathy (ICM, n = 41) and non-ischemic cardiomyopathy (NICM, n = 40) with 4.8-yrs follow-up. One patient had mixed ICM/NICM indications. Ventricular arrhythmias were assessed using intracardiac electrograms. Statistical analysis compared the total population and ICM and NICM groups using Kaplan-Meier for survival, Cox regression for mortality predictors, and binary logistic regression for predictors of ventricular arrhythmias (p < 0.05). Results: Major risk factors were hypercholesterolemia (70.7%), hypertension (47.6%), and obesity (41.5%). Severe obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) was found exclusively in NICM patients (23.7%, p = 0.001). Mortality was 30.5% after 4.8-yrs. The majority of patients (n=67) had no sustained ventricular arrhythmias yet 28% received therapy (n = 23), 18.51% were appropriate (n = 15), and 13.9% inappropriate (n = 11). Patients receiving ≥2 incidences of inappropriate shocks were 18-times more likely to die (p =0.013). Three sudden cardiac deaths (SCD) (3.7%) were prevented by the ICD. Conclusion: Patients implanted with an ICD in Townsville had 30.5% all-cause mortality after 4.8-yrs. Only 28% of patients received ICD therapy and 13.9% were inappropriate. OSA may have contributed to the fourfold increase in inappropriate therapy in NICM patients. Our study raises important efficacy, ethical and healthcare cost questions about who should receive an ICD, and possible regional and urban center disparities

Are Humans Natural? Part 3: Nature Relatedness and the American Dream

This learning module is part of a series of activities designed to encourage students to develop relational values with nature. In this activity, students reflect on their relationship with nature and consider the impact of their plans/goals for the future on the environment and the larger goal of sustainability. Students evaluate their relationship with nature through the Nature Relatedness (NR-6) Test (Nisbet and Zelenski, 2013), compare their NR-6 score to others, consider how their goals (“dreams”) are related to the American Dream, and speculate on the attainability of sustainability given our individually driven goals for the future. This activity challenges students to consider whether their individual dreams for the future are compatible with a sustainable interaction between humans and nature.https://rdw.rowan.edu/oer/1015/thumbnail.jp

Predicting arrhythmias in primary prevention heart failure patients: picking up the fragments

Identifying patients with high-risk heart failure (HF) who would benefit from an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) remains controversial. A potential marker for arrhythmic sudden death is fragmented QRS (fQRS). fQRS is the notching and slurring of the QRS complex in a 12-lead ECG and it indicates abnormal ventricular depolarisation and myocardial scarring and fibrosis. However, before fQRS complex can be included into selection criteria for ICD therapy, more complete reporting is required on their association with malignant arrhythmias, left ventricular remodelling and myocardial scarring/fibrosis in patients with HF. The molecular basis of the fQRS-arrhythmia-fibrosis connection in HF also needs to be explored. It is not widely appreciated that changes in the QRS complex and phases 0 and 1 of the ventricular action potential occur before contraction and predetermine Ca2+ release during contraction and later Ca2+ sparks. It is currently not known whether the different zig-zag patterns of the QRS are associated with aberrant Ca2+ cycling and arrhythmogenic sparks in patients with HF

The probability of non-isomorphic group structures of isogenous elliptic curves in finite field extensions, II

Let $E$ and $E'$ be 2-isogenous elliptic curves over \Q. Following \cite{ck}, we call a good prime $p$ \emph{anomalous} if E(\F_p) \simeq E'(\F_p) but E(\F_{p^2}) \not \simeq E'(\F_{p^2}). Our main result is an explicit formula for the proportion of anomalous primes for any such pair of elliptic curves. We consider both the CM case and the non-CM case.Comment: 29 page

Developing Digital Tools for Remote Clinical Research:How to Evaluate the Validity and Practicality of Active Assessments in Field Settings

The ability of remote research tools to collect granular, high-frequency data on symptoms and digital biomarkers is an important strength because it circumvents many limitations of traditional clinical trials and improves the ability to capture clinically relevant data. This approach allows researchers to capture more robust baselines and derive novel phenotypes for improved precision in diagnosis and accuracy in outcomes. The process for developing these tools however is complex because data need to be collected at a frequency that is meaningful but not burdensome for the participant or patient. Furthermore, traditional techniques, which rely on fixed conditions to validate assessments, may be inappropriate for validating tools that are designed to capture data under flexible conditions. This paper discusses the process for determining whether a digital assessment is suitable for remote research and offers suggestions on how to validate these novel tools

In vivo function and comparative genomic analyses of the Drosophila gut microbiota identify candidate symbiosis factors

Symbiosis is often characterized by co-evolutionary changes in the genomes of the partners involved. An understanding of these changes can provide insight into the nature of the relationship, including the mechanisms that initiate and maintain an association between organisms. In this study we examined the genome sequences of bacteria isolated from the Drosophila melanogaster gut with the objective of identifying genes that are important for function in the host. We compared microbiota isolates with con-specific or closely related bacterial species isolated from non-fly environments. First the phenotype of germ-free Drosophila (axenic flies) was compared to that of flies colonized with specific bacteria (gnotobiotic flies) as a measure of symbiotic function. Non-fly isolates were functionally distinct from bacteria isolated from flies, conferring slower development and an altered nutrient profile in the host, traits known to be microbiota-dependent. Comparative genomic methods were next employed to identify putative symbiosis factors: genes found in bacteria that restore microbiota-dependent traits to gnotobiotic flies, but absent from those that do not. Factors identified include riboflavin synthesis and stress resistance. We also used a phylogenomic approach to identify protein coding genes for which fly-isolate sequences were more similar to each other than to other sequences, reasoning that these genes may have a shared function unique to the fly environment. This method identified genes in Acetobacter species that cluster in two distinct genomic loci: one predicted to be involved in oxidative stress detoxification and another encoding an efflux pump. In summary, we leveraged genomic and in vivo functional comparisons to identify candidate traits that distinguish symbiotic bacteria. These candidates can serve as the basis for further work investigating the genetic requirements of bacteria for function and persistence in the Drosophila gut

Recon 2.2: from reconstruction to model of human metabolism.

IntroductionThe human genome-scale metabolic reconstruction details all known metabolic reactions occurring in humans, and thereby holds substantial promise for studying complex diseases and phenotypes. Capturing the whole human metabolic reconstruction is an on-going task and since the last community effort generated a consensus reconstruction, several updates have been developed.ObjectivesWe report a new consensus version, Recon 2.2, which integrates various alternative versions with significant additional updates. In addition to re-establishing a consensus reconstruction, further key objectives included providing more comprehensive annotation of metabolites and genes, ensuring full mass and charge balance in all reactions, and developing a model that correctly predicts ATP production on a range of carbon sources.MethodsRecon 2.2 has been developed through a combination of manual curation and automated error checking. Specific and significant manual updates include a respecification of fatty acid metabolism, oxidative phosphorylation and a coupling of the electron transport chain to ATP synthase activity. All metabolites have definitive chemical formulae and charges specified, and these are used to ensure full mass and charge reaction balancing through an automated linear programming approach. Additionally, improved integration with transcriptomics and proteomics data has been facilitated with the updated curation of relationships between genes, proteins and reactions.ResultsRecon 2.2 now represents the most predictive model of human metabolism to date as demonstrated here. Extensive manual curation has increased the reconstruction size to 5324 metabolites, 7785 reactions and 1675 associated genes, which now are mapped to a single standard. The focus upon mass and charge balancing of all reactions, along with better representation of energy generation, has produced a flux model that correctly predicts ATP yield on different carbon sources.ConclusionThrough these updates we have achieved the most complete and best annotated consensus human metabolic reconstruction available, thereby increasing the ability of this resource to provide novel insights into normal and disease states in human. The model is freely available from the Biomodels database (http://identifiers.org/biomodels.db/MODEL1603150001)